The directives
Along with urging people not to travel, regional authorities have been instructed to ensure an appropriate response, including at least two weeks of medication. The Global Times, the People’s Daily nationalist tabloid, reported that local communities have been advised to organize groups of drivers to transport infected people in need “when ambulances from medical facilities cannot arrive on time”.
Phase two after the “zero tolerance” policy
China, which until a month ago continued to pursue draconian “zero tolerance” policies towards Covid, also reckons with low vaccination rates among the elderly and more limited health resources outside of first-tier cities. Officially, a few dozen people have died from Covid in the last month, but analysts say the real number would be much higher, with forecasts of more than a million deaths by the end of the year.
Insufficient data
As recently as Wednesday, WHO emergencies chief Michael Ryan stressed his frustration with insufficient data from China, saying the number of deaths was “underreported”. The Chinese government stopped releasing most of the infection data since the sharp rise in cases began in December and on Monday provided the latest daily updates for Sunday January 8 (nearly 15,000 new cases), aiming to make the monthly switch from Reports following Covid downgrade from ‘disease A to disease B’
Replica of Beijing
In addition, Beijing counts virus-related deaths only if they are due to respiratory failure, prompting criticism from the WHO. “The main task in pandemics should be treatment,” stressed Liang Wannian, head of the government’s team of experts against the virus. Despite the “speculation by some Western media and politicians who have called the recent policy change a ‘turnaround’, the latest tweak is based on China’s scientific assessment of the current pandemic, based on prudent planning and a timely response,” the official Xinhua News Agency noted today firmly.